Home energy management systems and electric vehicles: challenges and opportunities

Abstract

Currently, residential users consume more electric energy during peak hours, mainly between 15h and 22h when the electricity prices are normally higher. Additionally, electric vehicle (EV) users tend to charge their vehicles at the same hours, increasing the impact on residential distribution networks. As a solution to these problems, a home energy management system (HEMS) can be used to decrease household energy demand at peak hours and reduce the impact of charging EVs in residential distribution networks. Additionally, HEMS can manage renewable energy sources and energy storage systems (ESS) to charge EVs in an efficient way. The aim of this paper is to analyse the different aspects and concepts related to home energy usage and residential charging of EVs, as well as presenting the challenges and opportunities of HEMS together with vehicle-to-home (V2H) concept.